


The Colors Underneath

by wastefulreverie



Series: PhannieMay Shots 2018 [17]
Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: ALMOST Character Death, Angst, Electrocution, Gen, Identity Reveal, Paranormal, Psychic, Psychic AU, revival
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-30
Updated: 2018-12-30
Packaged: 2019-10-01 00:24:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17233952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wastefulreverie/pseuds/wastefulreverie
Summary: After recovering from a ghost attack, Lancer sees the world differently.





	1. Revival

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for PhannieMay 2018 Day 18 - Revive.

 

A ghost attack had never killed anyone before, but due to recent events, it came frighteningly close. All of Amity Park had watched with grievous anticipation as Phantom painstakingly resuscitated the frail form of William Lancer after he had been thrown into a live power-line while trying to protect two of his students. The bald man lay sprawled across the asphalt, slowly losing signs of life.

After realizing the situation, Phantom had rushed down to tend to Lancer. Overwhelmed with immense fear, the ghost-boy checked Lancer's vitals and realized they were failing. His heart was about to stop beating and – oh, God – his heart was about to _stop_ beating. He couldn't die. Couldn't die. Shouldn't die.

It was all his fault. But blame wasn't what was important.

Yet, his mind still wandered negatively, distracting him from the present matter. Which is why, for one, fleeting second, Danny's mind unwillingly flickered back to the time where something similar had happened, and this very same man had been forgotten to the world. He'd been consumed by the fire that ripped apart Danny's entire life, and was left forgotten, his impact buried and his name erased. Once dead, there had been no remains of William Lancer. That couldn't happen again. Never again. He would save him this time, and everyone else.

( _But there is no everyone else, there's just Lancer – and he's_ dying _because you're daydreaming about fake futures and non-existent circumstances!_ )

Before he wondered about what he was actually doing, Danny acted nearly all on his instincts. He ignored the horrified gasps of the bystanders, too afraid to approach the trembling ghost-boy and the dying citizen, and he attempted to recall how to revive someone who was dying.

Sam screamed something from across the street and something clicked. But... was it too risky? Yes, it was way too risky. He was horribly afraid that he would only hurt his teacher more, but he had no other choice. Because, he couldn't let Lancer die. His life was literally in the balance and nobody here could do anything, nobody but him.

Danny was scared. He couldn't ignore that.

With no hesitation (despite everything inside him _screaming_ not to) Danny had charged up his hands with ecto-energy, using them as a makeshift defibrillator. He could tell that Lancer's heart wasn't beating, but he still had to try. There was no way in hell Danny would let his teacher die if there was any chance in saving him. This _had_ to work.

He pressed his hands against Lancer's gradually sinking chest and released an excess of energy that would usually be fatal, yet in this situation, it was ironically the opposite. Lancer's body twitched with the addition of pressure and foreign energy ripping through his heart, penetrating the fragile organ so it could restart.

 _It_ has _to restart_ , Danny thought, allowing those simple words to become a small chant in his head.

_Has to restart. Should restart. Must restart. Needs to restart._

Through his simultaneous state of panic and erratic thinking, Danny was actually surprised when the defibrillator worked. His heart released it's worry in exchange for relief, and his fear slowly started to melt away when he realized that it was over.

Lancer didn't wake up or dramatically start coughing, but Danny could feel his pulse begin to resume a less than steady pace, but his heart was still beating, which meant he was _alive_. Relieved, Danny extinguished his hands, and hazily awaited the paramedics, which he assumed someone had already called for.

Sam and Tucker, the two students who Lancer had sacrificed himself for, approached Danny gently. The three of them had no shame in admitting they were all crying into each others' arms.

Lancer would be alright. For now, anyway.

 


	2. Intertwined

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally written for PhannieMay 2018 day 30 - Together.

 

In every waking moment since the revival, everything had been different.

He'd woken up in the hospital with almost no recollection of what had happened. Lancer found himself hooked up to an IV and was serenaded by the dull sound of his heart monitor. He didn't remember how he had gotten there. The last thing Lancer recalled was... school. He was at the school, teaching of course, and BAM! He was lying on his back, wearing a gross hospital gown, and he was instantly surrounded by concerned nurses.

But the hospital... looked strange.

It was a regular room, but everything was cast in weird hues of green and blue. Everything else appeared dulled compared to the ethereal colors, and Lancer wondered if they'd put some kind of filter over his eyes. Even the nurses were engulfed in tinted shades of blue and green, and Lancer had been left with the unsettling feeling that he wasn't seeing the world correctly. Not to mention, when one of the nurses dimmed the lights in his room, Lancer observed that the quality of his vision actually increased.

It was odd, and William Lancer didn't like odd. He had so many questions, but he would have to let them wait

After a few minutes, the nurses reassured him that he could go back to sleep, and that he needed to rest. Lancer didn't want to rest, he wanted to know how he had gotten there. But his queries were snuffed out as the hospital staff left his room to tend to other patients. So, his only other choice was to sleep. He didn't know what had happened to him, but Lancer knew that he definitely felt weak.

When he awoke again, his thoughts were much more coherent and less confused. However, he still had no memory of what landed him in the hospital, and the world still looked different. The colors weren't balanced right, and everything was tainted with an eerie atmosphere.

Time passed, and he let the staff run diagnostics on him. Then, eventually, somebody explained that he'd had a brush with death during a ghost attack. Apparently he'd tried to save two of his students, Samantha Manson and Tucker Foley from getting hit by some power-lines, and in the process he'd gone into cardiac arrest. Lancer was shocked to learn that the only reason he was alive was because Danny Phantom had brought him back to life with his ghost powers as a defibrillator.

Lancer didn't know what possessed him to ask, but it felt right when he had said it. He looked to his doctor, Dr. Marshall, seriously.

“How long did my heart stop?”

Dr. Marshall looked startled. “I never said that it did.”

“You didn't,” Lancer nodded. “But how long was I dead?”

The white-coated man avoided eye contact with Lancer, and rustled through a stack of papers. He set them on the counter behind him and looked back at Lancer with a refreshed passiveness. “Phantom followed you here from the ambulance. He told us that he guessed it was no more than about a minute. But for one minute... you were dead. But what matters, is that you're still here. You're alive.”

Sometime later, Lancer elected to mention the odd coloration that he was seeing. How everything was bathed in greens, blues, and faint purples; warmer colors were almost nonexistent. His concern puzzled Dr. Marshall, and he suggested that maybe he had developed some kind of partial color blindness that prevented him from seeing those colors, so his brain altered his perception. He told Lancer that it wasn't a firm diagnosis, and that he specialized more with cardiac conditions rather than optimal, so he shouldn't dwell on his suggestion much.

Needless to say, Lancer wasn't reassured.

Since his injuries were so serious, the hospital had a strict no visitor policy for anyone outside of his family. But, Lancer had no immediate family, so he was left alone. He did, however, receive many cards. He got a card from almost all of his current students, all of his coworkers, and a handful of his previous students. There were three cards that stood out the most. The most obvious two were from the students that he had saved: Sam and Tucker. Both of them wrote lengthy apologetic letters and hopeful wishes that he healed thoroughly. They praised him for his heroism and unlike any of the other cards, these two felt the most genuine.

Then, there was the third card, which honestly shook Lancer to his core every time he read it.

It was a card from Phantom.

Phantom, oddly enough, apologized to him for allowing him to get hurt in the first place. He didn't talk much about how he had saved Lancer, but instead, focused on how he had failed to protect Lancer in the first place. It was inadequate; Phantom was Lancer's savior! He didn't need to apologize, because no matter what that ghost-boy thought, Phantom was _not_ the cause of Lancer's accident. Lancer was the one who had thrown himself in front of those wires, and he owed everything to Phantom for saving his life. Lancer owed him the gratitude, not the other way around!

The ghost's humbleness blew him away, and Lancer reflected pensively that Phantom needed more recognition for what he _did_ do for Amity Park. Even though Phantom hadn't left a return address, Lancer wrote his own letter to Phantom, expressing his appreciation and debt to the ghostly hero. That boy deserved it.

* * *

 It was a month and a half before Lancer got out of the hospital. By that point, there was only two weeks left before winter break, so the school let him off the hook until January. Lancer was nearing his mid-fifties and even though he was 'officially' healed, he still had to take it easy. The extra few weeks of vacation were a blessing, but come January, he had to return to work.

When he walked into Casper High, he observed with a sullenness that it too, appeared different. His vision had never gone back to normal since the accident and everything was still cast in those eerie colors. In fact, after a recent incident near his house, Lancer was starting to suspect that his perception of colors wasn't all that had changed. When he got back out into the world, he started seeing Amity's regular ghosts again, but not like he had remembered them. Like his ability to see in the dark, Lancer noticed that ghosts also appeared more enhanced.

He'd been taking a walk down the street, enjoying the fresh air that he'd been deprived of lately. In the hospital, he'd missed the outside, and decided to relish it while he was alive. _(Don't think about that minute, that only leads to scary thoughts.)_ Everything had been normal, or at least, his new version of normal if he considered the color thing. There was a cold breeze, there were people shifting in their warm houses, there were children with gloves playing at the end of their driveways, and there was a dog barking faintly in the distance. Around a street corner, there was a group of teenagers passing around what appeared to be a cigarette box, and Lancer narrowed his eyes suspiciously. He'd have to put a stop to that immediately.

Just when Lancer was about to give the delinquents a piece of his mind, there was a loud roaring noise, followed by downright cackling. The smaller children knowingly hid back inside their houses, and the teenagers down the block scattered. Lancer, who was having trouble running, hid himself behind some trashcans. There was a ghost near, and whatever it was, wasn't good.

A monstrous glowing motorcycle flew down the wintry street while carrying two ghostly passengers. Lancer's eyes were saucers when he saw the two ghosts through his own, weirdly altered vision. To put it simply, it was almost like he had x-ray vision, but it only worked with ghosts. He could see through their skin and see the inner workings of the ghostly energy dispersion along with their different colored auras. Before, he didn't know much about the ghost anatomy, and he hadn't wanted to know, but thanks to this new ability, he had a better idea.

The ghosts had flown away as soon as they had arrived, but the image of their 'energy skeletons' (the most appropriate thing to call it) was still burned into his memory. Shuddering, Lancer cleared his brain and tried not to think about his ability too much, and continued down the hallway to his classroom. Some of the students noticed him in the hallway and welcomed him back, and one Jasmine Fenton had even gone so far to hug him. Nevertheless, despite his many welcomes, he ended back in his usual room by 8 a.m., ready to begin his first class for the day.

Some students were happy to see he was better, while others expressed no concern at all. Lancer didn't let it affect him; teenagers were expected to be apathetic towards the elders, even though their blatant disrespect stung a little.

The day dragged on, uneventfully. However, his last class of the day... changed everything, to say the least.

It was his last Sophomore English class for the day, and he was approached by Sam and Tucker immediately. They hugged him, and thanked him again for everything, and Sam even shed a tear over the welfare of her teacher. She acted so cold and unemotional all the time, but Lancer knew that under her goth exterior, she was truly a caring girl.

After about a minute of awkward gratitude, Sam and Tucker took refuge in the back of the classroom, avoiding stray stares from their classmates. Lancer watched as Sam subtly saved a seat next to her, presumably for her friend, Danny Fenton, which only indicated that the boy was going to be tardy as usual. Lancer went ahead and marked him as late in his role-book, despite the fact that he hadn't taken attendance yet. Some things simply never changed.

He started the lesson that he had already recited twice that day, however, in the first five minutes the classroom door flung open, and in crept Danny. When he spotted the boy walking to the back of the room, Lancer abandoned his speech and trailed off. His mouth was open slightly ajar and his eyes were trained on Danny's form. Many people assumed Lancer was about to snap at the late boy, but instead, Lancer stared at him in mild captivation that almost made him want to throw up.

Where to begin? The blazing green outline of Danny's circulatory system that glowed through his skin, a star-burst wrapping itself around his heart – that he could _see_ visibly pumping. The green aura that wrapped around him, and then greenness that reflected in his eyes like a mirror. Layered on top of his circulatory system was a trail of otherworldly energy that he had seen in the ghosts from the street. Lancer was going to be sick, and that wasn't even the most disturbing part....

Lancer found himself recalling those lenticular Valentines cards; the ones you can turn to reveal two different pictures on top of each other, dependent on how you angle it towards your face. Danny was similarly like that, in a weird way. From different angles, Lancer could see flashes of white hair among black strands, and he could make out a mirage of Danny Phantom's famous symbol over Danny's chest.

He was horrified. It was like... Fenton and Phantom were fused _together_.

“Uh,” Danny said, noticing Lancer's weird fixation on him. “Mr. Lancer...?” Lancer snapped out of his trance, and Danny raised a nervous hand to his neck. He could still two people under his skin, he could still see ectoplasmic energy _imbued_ in him. “I know I came in late, and it's the first day back, and I know it's irresponsible and stuff-”

“Just... just sit down,” Lancer whispered, numbly.

Danny did so without a protest. Mr. Lancer stuttered intelligibly and continued reading from his lesson plan, but he kept his attention on Danny the entire time.

Was that even the real Danny Fenton? For a moment, Lancer convinced himself that Danny was just _overshadowed_ by Phantom, but that didn't explain why his heart was pumping ectoplasmic energy throughout his body. The Fentons had done a presentation on the dangers of overshadowing, so Lancer knew that overshadowing didn't change the biology of a host's body. So that meant that all that ghostly energy was actually Danny's and that – that...

Was Phantom, Danny? Or was Phantom just hiding inside him because Danny already had some sort of ectoplasmic physiology?

One thing was for sure, the two beings were intertwined together closer than what should've been possible.

* * *

 Lancer didn't approach Danny out of fear. That day, he let Danny Fenton and his friends walk out of his class with only the burden of homework and Lancer bit his tongue so hard that he was pretty sure he made it bleed. He wanted an answer, and badly, but he was too hesitant to force it upon his student. Not to mention, it was intimidating since he could see Danny's power surge within him, all the potential within his veins, and the state of his aura. (He didn't know how to interpret auras, though.)

After he got done grading that day's schoolwork, Lancer had convinced himself that he wouldn't receive an explanation from Danny that day. He put his head down on his desk in defeat and wanted to cry in frustration. It was mentally exhausting trying to interpret everything he was able to sense, and he'd already discovered more than he ever wanted to know. The information was torturing him. What _was_ Danny, and who was Phantom? Were they one? A shapeshifter, perhaps? It was a common trope within fiction.

Somewhere in the middle of his breakdown, an intruding voice permeated his thoughts.

“Are you okay?” the voice crackled and echoed. But Lancer _knew_ that voice.

He lifted his head so quickly that he temporarily saw black spots in his peripheral vision. Danny Phantom was sitting on a student's desk, gazing at Lancer with a true expression of concern. He looked more or less the same to Lancer; there was still the criss-cross of his circulatory system and core distribution, and if he tilted his head, he could see black hair and a white shirt mixed in with Phantom. It was uncanny.

“No,” Lancer admitted. He didn't know what brought on his honesty. “Everything looks so... different.”

“What do you mean?” Phantom asked. “The school? You were only gone two months, I didn't think it changed.”

“No,” he repeated. All of his exasperation came to the surface, and he blurted it all out. “Since the accident. Things haven't looked the same. Colors and ghosts... it's all weird. It's... _wrong_. And – and you, too, and I don't know what to think about anything.”

Phantom was quiet, and his expression grew pained. “This has been going on since the accident? You've been... seeing things?” he sounded guilty. “I'm so sorry. I should've visited you sooner, but after I dropped off your card, the Fentons rigged the hospital with ghost tech and over the holidays I was so busy and – I should've made sure you were okay.”

“You think everything is your fault,” Lancer said. “Stop.”

He looked down, ashamed, “What exactly has been happening with you? You're... seeing things?”

“It's almost like a colorblindness,” Lancer explained. It felt weird telling Phantom, or Danny, especially since he didn't know who he was right now. “Everything looks so blue, green, and purple, and all the other colors are so... gray.”

Phantom's eyes widened. “That sounds like what I see when I'm a ghost, I mean, since I am a ghost.” Lancer noticed his slip-up, processed the information, and ignored it for the moment. He had said 'when I'm a ghost', implying that sometimes he wasn't a ghost.

“The ghosts... I also... I don't know much about cores, but I think I can see them,” Lancer said. “And auras, auras too. Just ghost auras, not human, though.”

Phantom rested his head on his arm in thought. “From what you're describing... I think you might be a psychic. Somebody who can see the world in terms of ghostly wavelengths. I'm positive that it's from when you... when your heart stopped. I can understand how it can be scary. I was really scared too when I first saw the world like a ghost, it's natural. Well, it's natural to be afraid since it's an unnatural thing.”

“That's...” Lancer exhaled, “reassuring. Somewhat, not fully.”

“Understandable.”

“Because that's not all that I can see,” he said slowly.

“What else is there?” Phantom asked.

“I can see the energy in all ghosts, can't I? I can also see,” he paused, “I can see where you're bonded together with Danny Fenton. I can see him in you, right now, and earlier I saw you in him. I honestly don't understand.”

Phantom froze. His mouth opened a little bit, before shutting again, and he blinked faster than usual. “Uh... uh... damn it,” he whispered. “I guess you want an explanation, then?”

“Preferably, so my head doesn't implode. I've been trying to make sense of it for a few hours, and I'm at a loss.”

Phantom bit his lip, “So well, I'm the same person and all. I can just change between my two forms, like this.” Without a moment's notice, all of Danny's energy brightened dangerously and a white halo formed around his waist, sliding across him and transforming Phantom into Fenton. Now, his student was standing across from him, eyeing him warily. “Was that too much?”

Lancer was certainly in shock, but the better part of him decided to respond, “No. I just... wasn't expecting it. That's all.”

Danny continued his explanation and gave Lancer the abridged version of the accident and the decisions that lead to him entering the job of ghost hunting. He painstakingly tried to explain his bad grades and attendance, and Lancer was blown away by the boy's self-disappointment. Danny knew he could do better in everything, but he just didn't have the time or energy because he was doing something more important than school, which was something almost no other student could say.

Firmly, Lancer rummaged through his bag from home and found something he'd pocketed in the front compartment. A letter from the hospital that he'd never sent, addressed to Phantom.

“I'll try to be more lenient now that I know the truth, but I can't be ridiculous. There are other teachers and students who'll notice. So whenever you feel a little down on yourself, stop forcing yourself to believe it's your fault. That goes beyond grades too. Not everything that goes wrong happens because of you, and sometimes you just need a reminder.”

Danny took the letter. “Thanks, Mr. Lancer. Y – you're really better than I thought, for helping me out and all, and not telling out.”

“Daniel, you saved my life,” he said.

“I...” he remembered what Lancer had said about self-blame, and nodded. “I gotta go home now. Jazz is probably wondering where I am, and I don't want her to think that I've gotten kidnapped again or something.”

Lancer's mind was horrified by Danny's normalcy with that statement, but he pretended to go along with it. Danny walked out of the door to Lancer's room, and just under his skin, he and Phantom walked together. It was definitely something for Lancer to get used to.

 


End file.
